Setting up and running practices and clinics is especially challenging in the time of COVID-19. After relying on virtual care for many months, physicians are expanding in-person care in their practices. In doing so, they must ensure strict safety requirements are met to keep staff and patients.

This is necessitating changes to traditional office workflows and procedures. Many physicians are considering how to create “hybrid” practices that incorporate both virtual and in-person care.

The following toolkits provide practical and useful information to help, including a safety plan template that can be downloaded for individual office planning:

The Doctor is In: Recommendations for expanding in-person care in community-based physician practices is a one-stop source of information prepared by and for physicians. It summarizes the official guidelines and provides insights and templates to support effective implementation to ensure a safe practice environment.

A safety plan template for developing individualized office plans can be found here.

The Back to Practice Guide provides advice on creating blended models where virtual care visits are offered along with in-person clinic visits.

A webinar addresses concerns and questions for specialists with community offices.

Mentoring and coaching to support physicians to support re-opening of physician offices is provided by the Practice Support Program. More information can be found here.

The patient virtual care guide provides useful information for patients on how to connect with physicians to arrange for virtual care visits.

Official guidelines provided by the College, Provincial Health Officer, BCCDC, and WorkSafeBC can be found here.

The CMA Infobase is a public database of evidence-based clinical practice guidelines, currently including over 1200 guidelines developed or endorsed by an authoritative medical or health organization in Canada.

Online clinical resources including more than 1000 full-text medical journals, 50+ textbooks, clinical practice guidelines, and a complete medical reference library.

Have questions or comments? E-mail us at communications@doctorsofbc.ca